Day 27: Catch Me If You Can

Novi Sad to Stari Banovci (66km)

Today is to be my last day with the guys, they plan to take the remainder of the river a little more leisurely than me, having already booked their flights home, it doesn’t make much sense for them to rush it. We spent the day in Novi Sad yesterday, enjoying the city, another sunset boat cruise and a music festival in the evening. The captain gave me the responsibility of barman for the boat cruise, a task I assumed I was up to. I was wrong. I took the order of five women and returned to the bar where the captain was driving the boat. I relayed the order to him and was told that we didn’t have any of the items, one of which was water. Toby then took over driving responsibilities, while the captain assumed my position of barman, I was left to enjoy the sunset in disgrace.

This morning, we thanked Captain and Sanja and were on our way. If anyone ever visits Novi Sad, I can’t recommend the sunset cruise on the Dunavski Boat highly enough. The passed peacefully, after about 50km, the guys found a great spot for camping and pulled up onto the bank. My plan was to continue on for another 15km to the town of Stari Banovci. It has been a great week with the guys, being with other people gave much more confidence to camp in the wilderness and we found a couple of beauties. Having other people to share the inevitable hilarity was also a huge bonus and the last week has been made immensely more enjoyable by their company. Their task now is to keep up with me and catch me if they can.

The last few kilometres of the day passed nicely and I arrived shortly before sunset. I checked into a hotel, my first for a while and was glad to be there. After a well overdue shower, I headed downstairs for dinner. I was then told by the kind waiter what I would be having for dinner. This method of telling the customer what they are eating without the option of a menu is a novel one, but I must say, it has been surprisingly effective so far and was again on this occasion.

Back on my own on this lonely river, it’s been a great week with the guys but now it’s time to kick on across Serbia and into the unknown world to come.